Magistrate Desmond Nair has ruled that Pistorius's case is a schedule six offence. That makes it extremely unlikely the defendant will be granted bail unless the defence can provide exceptional circumstances.

I haven't read any of the coverage, but from what I've heard on the radio this is what I've gathered is his story:

He and his smokin' hot girlfriend went out and had a romantic Valentine's Day dinner, then retired to his house. At some point, he heard a bump and commotion in the night. Crawled out of his bed sans legs but avec pistol to investigate. Heard noises in the bathroom, presumed intruder had entered through window in said bathroom. Bathroom door was locked, from the inside. Pistorious - having not ascertained the whereabouts of his girlfriend - fired through the door at the noise, and killed his girlfriend. And then somehow got blood on a cricket bat?

tifosi77 wrote:I haven't read any of the coverage, but from what I've heard on the radio this is what I've gathered is his story:

He and his smokin' hot girlfriend went out and had a romantic Valentine's Day dinner, then retired to his house. At some point, he heard a bump and commotion in the night. Crawled out of his bed sans legs but avec pistol to investigate. Heard noises in the bathroom, presumed intruder had entered through window in said bathroom. Bathroom door was locked, from the inside. Pistorious - having not ascertained the whereabouts of his girlfriend - fired through the door at the noise, and killed his girlfriend. And then somehow got blood on a cricket bat?

Yeah, I can see how his attorney would think this is a good story.

Spoiler:

:face:

Seems to skip over the (unconfirmed) part of the story where she got a text message from a rugby player on South Africa's national team while they were laying in bed together and proceeded to argue before she went into the bathroom.

after he fired three shots, and heard something, why wouldnt he check before putting on his legs? also, if he heard a noise in the first place, wouldnt that be the best time to get your legs on? rather than after capping a mysterious intruder three times?

I’m not defending this guy, but South Africa’s crime rates are through the roof, and home-invasion robberies and “hot” burglaries (burglaries where the residents are home at the time) are unfortunately quite common. It’s not unusual for “good” communities to not only be gated, but to be patrolled 24/7 by armed guards with semi-auto rifles. The crime rates are that bad. In that light, a defense that Pistorius thought there was an intruder in the house might be more believable to South Africans than to us.

Unfortunately, it's not that simple in SA. Weird laws over there. There was a case last year where a guy came home to his house in a walled off community to find 2 robbers in his house, raping his wife. He shot them dead with his legally registered handgun. He was then tried and convicted of murder. Got life and the scum's family received a large amount of restitution from him. The governments argument was that deadly force wasn't needed even though they had machetes and were in the process of doing the deed... He apparently was supposed to detain them somehow and call the police instead because they weren't actually trying to kill her or him. During the trial it came out the deceased were HIV positive and the defense tried to argue that the rape was them in fact using deadly force, but the judge agreed with the prosecution that the defendant had no way of knowing that fact at the time even though it's a well known fact that the SA poor population has the highest rate of HIV in the world. Like I said, strange place...

Unfortunately, it's not that simple in SA. Weird laws over there. There was a case last year where a guy came home to his house in a walled off community to find 2 robbers in his house, raping his wife. He shot them dead with his legally registered handgun. He was then tried and convicted of murder. Got life and the scum's family received a large amount of restitution from him. The governments argument was that deadly force wasn't needed even though they had machetes and were in the process of doing the deed... He apparently was supposed to detain them somehow and call the police instead because they weren't actually trying to kill her or him. During the trial it came out the deceased were HIV positive and the defense tried to argue that the rape was them in fact using deadly force, but the judge agreed with the prosecution that the defendant had no way of knowing that fact at the time even though it's a well known fact that the SA poor population has the highest rate of HIV in the world. Like I said, strange place...

Before researching SA, I always thought it was a much more... civilized place.

Unfortunately, it's not that simple in SA. Weird laws over there. There was a case last year where a guy came home to his house in a walled off community to find 2 robbers in his house, raping his wife. He shot them dead with his legally registered handgun. He was then tried and convicted of murder. Got life and the scum's family received a large amount of restitution from him. The governments argument was that deadly force wasn't needed even though they had machetes and were in the process of doing the deed... He apparently was supposed to detain them somehow and call the police instead because they weren't actually trying to kill her or him. During the trial it came out the deceased were HIV positive and the defense tried to argue that the rape was them in fact using deadly force, but the judge agreed with the prosecution that the defendant had no way of knowing that fact at the time even though it's a well known fact that the SA poor population has the highest rate of HIV in the world. Like I said, strange place...

Before researching SA, I always thought it was a much more... civilized place.

It's not as bad as it is made out to be, but it isn't the safest place in the world. One just has to always be aware of what is going on in their surroundings, which is good advice in any area. You just know which places you shouldn't go and never stop for anything besides your destination after dark. Yes, you live behind walls/barbed wire/electric fences and it's completely normal there. But that being said, I'm getting married in 2 months, and my job wants me to relocate there for a year sometime this summer. Of course I'd rather stay in the US, but I really do not have a big issue concerning mine, or more importantly, my fiancee's safety there. Of course, the offer from the company to relocate has provided incentives that help alleviate concerns like armed guards in the compound where we'd live, free rent while I'm there in a place much nicer than we have here, flights home to visit relatives, flights for relatives to visit us, live in domestic help, and of course, a nice bump in pay. I actually love visiting SA, I've been there 9 times in the last 2 years. It's absoulutely beautiful and the "normal", non-criminal people are among the nicest I've met in my travels around the world. The problems stem from a huge divide between the haves and have nots. The poor are very poor with literally almost nothing and they do what they feel they have to do to survive. There really is no middle class. Also, there is the touchy subject of racism. If you think racism is bad here, go there. There is a large majority of both races that openly hate each other. It is steadily getting better, but they are about 50-60 years behind where we are now with respect to this issue. Although it is very disconcerting to go by a demonstration where the ANC is protesting something and chanting their ever popular, "Kill the Boer (Whitey)" song. But, where else can one hold and play with 4 - 2 month old lions, which might be one of the coolest things I've ever gotten to do?

Unfortunately, it's not that simple in SA. Weird laws over there. There was a case last year where a guy came home to his house in a walled off community to find 2 robbers in his house, raping his wife. He shot them dead with his legally registered handgun. He was then tried and convicted of murder. Got life and the scum's family received a large amount of restitution from him. The governments argument was that deadly force wasn't needed even though they had machetes and were in the process of doing the deed... He apparently was supposed to detain them somehow and call the police instead because they weren't actually trying to kill her or him. During the trial it came out the deceased were HIV positive and the defense tried to argue that the rape was them in fact using deadly force, but the judge agreed with the prosecution that the defendant had no way of knowing that fact at the time even though it's a well known fact that the SA poor population has the highest rate of HIV in the world. Like I said, strange place...

Before researching SA, I always thought it was a much more... civilized place.

It's not as bad as it is made out to be, but it isn't the safest place in the world. One just has to always be aware of what is going on in their surroundings, which is good advice in any area. You just know which places you shouldn't go and never stop for anything besides your destination after dark. Yes, you live behind walls/barbed wire/electric fences and it's completely normal there. But that being said, I'm getting married in 2 months, and my job wants me to relocate there for a year sometime this summer. Of course I'd rather stay in the US, but I really do not have a big issue concerning mine, or more importantly, my fiancee's safety there. Of course, the offer from the company to relocate has provided incentives that help alleviate concerns like armed guards in the compound where we'd live, free rent while I'm there in a place much nicer than we have here, flights home to visit relatives, flights for relatives to visit us, live in domestic help, and of course, a nice bump in pay. I actually love visiting SA, I've been there 9 times in the last 2 years. It's absoulutely beautiful and the "normal", non-criminal people are among the nicest I've met in my travels around the world. The problems stem from a huge divide between the haves and have nots. The poor are very poor with literally almost nothing and they do what they feel they have to do to survive. There really is no middle class. Also, there is the touchy subject of racism. If you think racism is bad here, go there. There is a large majority of both races that openly hate each other. It is steadily getting better, but they are about 50-60 years behind where we are now with respect to this issue. Although it is very disconcerting to go by a demonstration where the ANC is protesting something and chanting their ever popular, "Kill the Boer (Whitey)" song. But, where else can one hold and play with 4 - 2 month old lions, which might be one of the coolest things I've ever gotten to do?

Finally, another racist word for white people besides "cracker". I've been looking for one for years!

Boer (pron.: /ˈbʊər/, /ˈboʊ.ər/, or /ˈbɔər/; Afrikaans: [ˈbuːr]) is the Dutch and Afrikaans word for farmer, which came to denote the descendants of the Dutch-speaking settlers of the eastern Cape frontier[2] in Southern Africa during the 18th century, as well as those who left the Cape Colony during the 19th century to settle in the Orange Free State, Transvaal (which are together known as the Boer Republics), and to a lesser extent Natal. Their primary motivations for leaving the Cape were to escape British rule and extract themselves from the constant border wars between the British imperial government and the native tribes on the eastern frontier.

Although, both groups have plenty of other despicable, racist terms for each other that are unique to the area. I won't share them here because we already have enough racist terms that are thrown around here and there's no need to add to the hate.